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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27892258">Be Yourself (Everyone Else is Taken)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/hurricaneredd/pseuds/hurricaneredd'>hurricaneredd</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Every Saint has a Past (and Every Sinner has a Future) [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>An exploration of one bard we all love, Gen, Look if you're looking for that good Zolf/Wilde action you're going to be waiting such a long time, M/M, Over thirty years of life to cover, Slow Burn, a.k.a the life &amp; times of Oscar Wilde</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 16:35:32</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>490</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27892258</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/hurricaneredd/pseuds/hurricaneredd</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde is known for many things. Bard, poet, right stubborn and smug pain in the ass. But how did he get to be that way?</p>
<p>Come along for the journey that's led the bard to where he is today.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Zolf Smith/Oscar Wilde</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Every Saint has a Past (and Every Sinner has a Future) [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2042413</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>9</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Be Yourself (Everyone Else is Taken)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/hgb/gifts">hgb</a>.</li>



    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>He was seven when he first learned that words had power. Precocious and far too curious for his own good, he was often found running and getting into places that he shouldn’t have, and that day was no different.</p>
<p>He couldn’t tell you how he managed it. By all means, he shouldn’t have been able to get the key so easily, but all it took was a little bit of soft humming, and the maid drifted off to sleep. Still, he wasn’t one to look a gift horse in the mouth. He’d quickly snatched the key and scurried off in the direction of his mother’s sitting room, sneaking in as quickly and quietly as a seven year old could. </p>
<p>It wasn’t the first time he’d been in here, but it was the first time he was here without his mother present. Trying to take it all in, he soon grew tired of it. Why was this room locked? As far as he could tell, there was nothing worth keeping secret.</p>
<p>He would have missed it as he grew bored and restless. He would have missed that little box tucked away in the far corner of the room, hidden underneath inane little “projects” he’d seen his mother work on occasionally. But he saw it out of the corner of his eye, a flash of an unassuming box carefully buried beneath junk as his seven year old self saw it.  Curiosity piqued, he pulled it out and greedily opened the lid, digging out the contents.</p>
<p>There he sat, surrounded by clipped newspapers with pieces written from one Speranza. He’d read through each one voraciously, feeling himself being moved with each word, each sentence. Something stirred within him, filling his chest with a sort of excitement he’d never felt before. His hands tingled as he tore through more and more of the articles. Impassioned cries calling for revolution and decrees of Irish freedom from Britain filled his him with a heady rush. He didn’t know why these were locked away in his mother’s sitting room, but it didn’t matter. All that did was the power behind each word. </p>
<p>A thought niggled at the back of his mind, one he couldn’t quite connect yet, but he pursued it, pulling at threads and following them. His mother’s sitting room. Powerful words locked away. Meetings—his mind drifted back to meetings he snuck in to see. His mother. Women he didn’t know. Heated words full of passion, spoken so freely between them in the privacy of those four walls. </p>
<p>Slowly, he made the connections. Slowly, he chased each thread. Of course. <em>Of course</em>. It made sense. </p>
<p>Words have power, he’d learned. And maybe his mother’s words didn’t quite have the same power that he would later learn himself, but they were still powerful in their own right. And without that spark of realization, who knew if he’d ever become the man he was destined to be?</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Ahhh!!! I was planning on not publishing this until I had so much of it written, but I've been sitting on it too long and have been itching to get it out there. </p>
<p>Anyway, here it is--my magnum opus. A.K.A. my long ass fic that explores the life of one disastrous bi bard, exploring the depths that we  get glimpses of in the podcast. It's going to be a long ass fic, so do keep that in mind and bear with me as things unfold. I've already got over 25 chapters outlined and am still going strong, and that's not even touching on all the things that've happened in canon up to this point. I also draw on a lot of historical Wilde's past up until the obvious divergence, so be prepared for more random tidbits like his mother writing under the name of Speranza and hosting meetings with other women and such. If that's not your cup of tea, that's completely understandable. And, as always, the title of the fic, the series, and various chapters are all taken from Wilde quotes. </p>
<p>If you're waiting for that good, good Zolf/Wilde content, you're going to be waiting an extremely long time. But I promise, it's there. It's going to be real. I love those two too much not to include them.</p>
<p>Finally, this is gifted to my partner in Wilde angst crimes, Heather. She's dealt with months of me screaming and then randomly popping in sporadically to drop feels on her, so it's only fair really.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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